Once upon a time, there were three princesses. They were walking in the forest one day, when they got stuck in the mud. Then a mama bird came and she grabbed one of the legs and pulled it out with her beak! She did it for all of them so they could all walk again. Then, they all turned into baby birds and the mommy bird brought them food. Yummy worms!
There was a bad guy who got stuck in the mud. Mama Bird pulled out his leg and ate his leg up. Because he was bad to her. He hit her.
Then the three princesses went back to the castle and became princesses again.
Nikki draws and writes her story. The mama bird's nest is pictured on the left, the three princesses and a smaller nest on the right. The little blue bird on the right-hand picture is the bird I drew. She asked me to cut it out and then she taped it onto the nest she had drawn.I marvel, again and again, at the human capacity to make stories of anything: a picture, an image in our minds, a feeling, an experience. People say, "Even four-year-olds can do it!" but I find that so diminuitive. Because really, four-year-olds are some of the best story makers I've ever met, far better than I could ever imagine myself to be as an adult.
I'm making all these observations while concurrently reading several books about storytelling, story making, and how inherent narrative is to how our brains function. I'm working on a few posts that relate to each of these books, so stay tuned!
